Hanging Men, 2007

CommentarySince 2005 Atelier van Lieshout has been producing a series of monochrome black and white figurative sculptures. They bluntly depict people, tortured and killed in humiliating situations. This contrasts seemingly with the simple, improvised and succinct working of the figures. Sometimes they are modeled in polyethaline foam which seems freshly sprayed, sometimes they resemble inflating or deflating balloons in their graphicness. The ›Hanging Men‹ recalls, as motif, historical descriptions of war or torture such as the ›Hanging Tree‹ from Jacques Callot’s ›Les Misères et les Malheurs de la guerre‹ (1633) and scenes from the ›Desastres de la Guerra‹ (1810-1814) by Francisco José de Goya y Lucientes.The depiction of the four ›Hanging Men‹ suspended from a beam is – according to the artist – also to be understood as a self-portrait of the artist. Joep van Lieshout – maltreated in a disciplinary process by the authorities – was forced to recognize the failure of the Free AVL town in the port of Rotterdam which he had proclaimed after little more than a year. Atelier van Lieshout also opens his own homepage with a drawn version of this motif.

Since 2005 Atelier van Lieshout has been producing a series of monochrome black and white figurative sculptures. They bluntly depict people, tortured and killed in humiliating situations. This contrasts seemingly with the simple, improvised and succinct working of the figures. Sometimes they are modeled in polyethaline foam which seems freshly sprayed, sometimes they resemble inflating or deflating balloons in their graphicness. The ›Hanging Men‹ recalls, as motif, historical descriptions of war or torture such as the ›Hanging Tree‹ from Jacques Callot’s ›Les Misères et les Malheurs de la guerre‹ (1633) and scenes from the ›Desastres de la Guerra‹ (1810-1814) by Francisco José de Goya y Lucientes.The depiction of the four ›Hanging Men‹ suspended from a beam is – according to the artist – also to be understood as a self-portrait of the artist. Joep van Lieshout – maltreated in a disciplinary process by the authorities – was forced to recognize the failure of the Free AVL town in the port of Rotterdam which he had proclaimed after little more than a year. Atelier van Lieshout also opens his own homepage with a drawn version of this motif.